When somebody wants to end a relationship, they don’t engage in a rational conversation, they engage in rudeness, spite, and provocation. The end of the end may be a rational discussion, but the beginning of the end nearly always starts with unpleasantness. The manner of Len McClusky’s conduct in recent times has been unacceptable. This is not clumsiness, ignorance or accident. It is downright rude, and he knows it.

When the Tories have attacked Labour’s union relationship in the past, it has had little effect. Voters know Labour is fearful of indulging the unions to much, and that the unions are benevolent to ordinary people. However, the recent Tory attacks are different. Cameron, at PMQs, was not attacking Len McClusky, he was attacking Ed Miliband. His allegation was that Miliband is not in control.Read the rest of this entry »

Year on year, every year, contractors and suppliers have to do their job for less money. These days it is written into the contract that savings will be made next year and the year after, so it is no longer just about suppliers believing they can save money now, it is also about faith in a future that will somehow, from somewhere, deliver savings.

So if I bid for a contract to clean a residential street, I must calculate the cost of the worker and the cost of his brush and pan, and then I must seek to reduce it. Next year I must reduce it more, and the year following, more still.

The previous Labour government were very much a part of encouraging this process, because the economy used to be so inefficient, and there is no doubt that we have a more competitive economy as a result. However, there are costs to the never ending pressure on suppliers.Read the rest of this entry »

During the tense two years following the Credit Crunch, widespread predictions of civil disorder were both highly credible and seemingly inevitable, but no winter of discontent nor summer of strife came to pass. Yet, the people whose efforts successfully averted this destructive course have gone unrecognised and unappreciated. That’s a great shame and it should be rectified.

When the Lindsey Oil Refinery workers burst into spontaneous anger and destruction, the fire was quenched by the Unions who went in and established a dialogue between Management and Workers. They kept the refinery working and left the media to look elsewhere for their story.Read the rest of this entry »